February 9, 2011

‘‘Soldier Field is a sacred Chicago landmark that honors our veterans and, as mayor, Gery would be very careful to protect that,’’ said Brooke Anderson, spokeswoman for candidate Gery Chico. ‘‘He would be open to exploring creative ideas that could attract sponsors while preserving the Soldier Field name and stadium to give soldiers the respect they deserve.’’

But Rahm Emanuel, Carol Moseley Braun and Miguel del Valle are adopting the same hard-line stance as Mayor Daley, who insisted the stadium name remain untouched for his support of a $587 million renovation of Soldier Field in 2003.

Teams with stadiums names like "Giants Stadium" and "Cowboy Stadium" are in a much better position to cash in. But maybe it's better to have a name that can't be swapped for a sponsor's name, like Lambeau Field. Then you're not tempted to scramble for the money and end up with a horrible name like "Mall of America Field at Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome," which really is the name of the place where the Vikings play. You're Vikings. That's your image. Legendary conquerors... traipsing around the mall with Hubert Humphrey. What a picture!

And I love this grandiose term "metrodome." There are metrodomes, stadiums, and fields. Notice the inverse relationship between grandiosity and greatness.

ADDED: I'm just noticing that Minnesota inserted "field" into its ridiculous new name that still contains "metrodome." Make up your mind. Interesting that the big corporation wanted to associate itself with the old-fashioned charm of "field," while the politician's name is stuck with the overinflated term "metrodome." And I do mean overinflated, because remember how it collapsed? And it's a good word to associate with Hubert Humphrey, since he had quite a large dome of a head.

It has nothing to do with football, but on the subject of Hubert H. Humphrey — Hubert Horatio Humphrey — and names, this is always hilarious:

And as long as I'm descending into Humphrey-related YouTube hell, there's this:

In Denver, it was hard for many people to see Mile High Stadium replaced by Invesco Field at Mile High. It was harder to see Fiddler's Green Amphitheater change to Comfort Dental Amphitheater (yikes!). However, the baseball stadium is Coors Field and that just seems to fit.

• Phrases to avoid at all times: "How did that Brett Favre thing work out for you?" ... "You should just give up and come root for the Packers." ... and, most importantly, "I forget. How many Super Bowls have the Vikings won?"

"In 1998, Anderson signed with the Minnesota Vikings and converted all 35 of his attempted field goals and all 59 extra points in regular season play, becoming the first placekicker to finish the regular season with a 100% success rate on both field goals and extra points. However, Anderson would miss his most crucial attempt of the season in the NFC Championship Game vs. the Atlanta Falcons. With the Vikings leading 27-20 with 2:07 left in the 4th quarter, Anderson lined up for a 38-yard field goal to give them a two possession lead. A converted kick would have, barring a miracle, delivered the Vikings to their first Super Bowl in 22 years. The missed kick gave the Falcons a chance, and they took full advantage of it by traveling down the field and scoring the tying touchdown sending the game to overtime. The Falcons would then win the game in overtime on, coincidently, a 38-yard kick by Morten Andersen at almost the same spot. It was a bitter pill to swallow for the Vikings who went 15-1 in the regular season."

When I was in high school, round about 1968, I saw HHH speak at an airport rally in Dallas.

This speech made a big impression on me, I came away with two strong convictions:

1) HHH was a very decent man, who was likable and honest. He was cheerful and upbeat, a lot like President Reagan in personality.

2) He said (and I remember this exactly): 'Programs, Programs, Programs! Some of them work, some of them don't, but they all help people!'

This seemed like an insane statement to me, then and now. HHH was telling us that he saw no limit to the size and scope of government, and didn't care how much he spent.

At least he didn't pretend to be conservative. HHH was the second to last honest liberal politician in American history, the last being Mr McGovern.

Sadly we elected Nixon, who grew the government far more aggressively than HHH ever could have.

Why liberals hate Nixon is beyond me. He got us out of Viet Nam.

Nixon fought for a huge universal health care, started EITC, started the EPA, imposed a 55mph speed limit, and championed a powerful Presidency. Nixon had way more in common with Obama than with Reagan.

I've been to tailgate parties at the hump dome. You have to go about 5 or more blocks away to have one in some business parking lot. Nobody else around. The whole thing just sucked. The dome is sucky, sucky, sucky. Even baseball games were strange, looking down into the hole in the ground. The best times for Vikings fans is when the play the Packers and they can go to a real field, a field of champions.

"Original Mike said... When they were considering selling the naming rights for Lambeau Field, I wanted to buy them and name it, "It's Lambeau Field, damn it!".

Not that I have any money."

That's scary, man. Totally scary. Because I said the exact same thing: When they were talking about the name for what is now known as Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, I told many friends that if I were a billionaire, I'd buy up the naming rights and call it the "Hoosier Dome, dammit", with the "dammit" specifically included in the name. I always hated calling the old playing field the "RCA Dome". And yes, I have friends who witnesses my tirades. It was the exact same one as yours, just for a different fieldhouse.

Of course, the new stadium ended up not being a dome. But I didn't know that at the time I was ranting.

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Word Verification: myossess. A type of biological process, in the same vein as but still distinct from mytossess.

Except for a preseason game eons ago, I've never attended a football game at Lambeau Field. But when we went to the 2006 NCAA hockey regionals at the Resch Center, which is a couple of blocks from Lambeau, we made sure to show up well before the first game so we could tailgate in the Lambeau Field parking lot. Hadta do it. Also made sure we ate at Curly's Pub on that trip.

I've got to put in a good word here for the Superdome in N.O. So far-sighted was its design that some 40 odd years later it's STILLa more than adequate facility (albeit w.o. some of the pvt.. exclusive entrances, etc. "perks" for the "swells" that some of the newerstadiums have) Loongg after many far newer stadiums built afterwords have been razed as obsolete..

I believe they can double up on sponsorship rights or "preserve the integrity of the name" by selling a separate name for the field, specifically the playing surface "Mall of America Field" and then a name for the stadium/seating area.

For example, UCLA plays on the Nell and John Wooden Court at the Pauley Pavilion.

Since Edwin Pauley kicked in about 20% of the cost of construction, they can't rename the arena for Wooden, but they really need to honor him somehow, and they do that by a separate name for the court.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauley_Pavilion

At least those two names have ties to UCLA. When you get multiple corporate names, it becomes insanely unwieldy.

Speaking of naming rights (almost typed rites, which might not have been a mistake as there is a quasi-religious nature to the way sports are presented in this nation), the real future home of the artists formerly known as the Vikings (I suspect the name will stay in Minnesota, even if the team doesn't), has a new name, FARMERS FIELD.

The stadium hasn't been approved, it doesn't have any tenants, but Farmers Insurance Group has promised to pay $700M over 30 years to name the place should it go forward.

And if current Vikings fans want to look for bad omens, notice in the slide of an artists rendering of fans walking towards the stadium at LA Live, their jerseys are in Vikings purple and white (which might be a nod to the Lakers, rather than the Vikings).

They are selling this place with the idea that they'll get 2 NFL teams (as well as two other teams, presumably UCLA and USC football, too), be the premiere site for conventions of all kinds, bring the Final Four back to LA, as well as the Olympics and World Cup, and most ridiculously, the NHL Outdoor Classic (outdoor hockey in LA on New Year's Day seems a bit ambitious and technically difficult), and expect a ton of Superbowls to be scheduled for LA (like 4 out of the next 10 once the Stadium is finished).

AEG has the political clout to actually get this thing done (adding Magic Johnson as a high profile investor was a very savvy move), and both the Vikings and Jaguars are being targeted (or are using the threat to get better stadium deals out of their current homes), but deals that seemed in place have fallen apart before, so the Vikings might still continue to stink up the HumpDome for years to come.

Not unexpectedly, this being the Times, the author isn't adverse to having the city simply break the contract with Citibank and seize back the name of the stadium (you can make a good argument that Citi Field should never have opened as Citi Field in the first place and the bank should have given up the right to spend millions on it when they were taking federal bailout dollars at the same time, but I think if you've signed a contract with a bank that has hundreds of branches in the NYC metro area, you need to come up with a better reason to abrogate the contract than just "I don't like the company".

Citi Field, as corporate names go, isn't all that bad. As for the 'bailout', Citi going under would have been a very costly alternative. As it is, it looks like the taxpayer 'investment' in Citi will turn a profit. Besides, who'd rather see the $20 mil spent for the naming rights go into the pockets of senior execs at bonus time?

And I'm just as pleased as punch to lay waste to these urban mall rats, to see them driven in chains before me and hear the lamentations of their women. Attention Hot Topic shoppers, prepare to meet some real Goths!

Monster dot com bought naming rights to Candlestick Park and changed the name to Monster Park. Not bad, but locals and fans still call it The Stick.

Good example of the problem with 'offical' names.

The only place you'll see 'A-10 Thunderbold II' is in a press release - to users, it's just 'the Hog'. Or you can take your pick of 'Skytrain' or 'Gooney Bird' -'Thunderchief or Thud' - 'Strato-Fortress' or 'BUFF'.